Financial services recovery would drive UK economy and jobs - PwC

LONDON

LONDON (Reuters) - A properly run financial services industry would generate a quarter of a million new British jobs by 2020, oiling the wheels of sectors such as manufacturing and retail, a new report says.

Research published on Monday by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) suggests that robust regulation and benign economic conditions that help the embattled financial sector to recover would also spur 2-3 percent growth in the economy by the end of the decade.

An alternative scenario, in which the financial services sector continues to languish, would bring an unimpressive 0.2 percent rise in gross domestic product and create only 12,000 more jobs, the report said.

"In addition to providing credit, (the financial services industry) creates demand in other sectors and helps improve the flow (of) capital around the economy," said Nick Forrest, an economist at PwC.